How do you spell “B-A-C-K-F-I-R-E”? I spell it “F-I-S-H-Y.” Or maybe D-o-u–g-l-a-s-s, L-i-n-d-a. Bad move, guys, asking people to tell the government if they know anyone who is now, or who ever has been, opposed to Obama’s health care “reforms.”

This will be a big one. Obama really put his foot in it with GatesGate, accusing the Cambridge police of “acting stupidly” when Sgt. Jimmy Crowley arrested “Eminent Professor” Henry Louis Gates of Harvard — Harvard! — for disorderly conduct and then seeking to weasel out of the ensuing mess with a disingenuous piece of equivocation followed by beers all around at the White House. If that was a “teachable moment,” you would have thought the Obama administration would have learned something about how to respond to criticism.

Doesn’t look that way. Opposition to the Democrats’ proposal to have the government swallow up health care, impose rationing, limit treatment for seniors, extend waiting time for everyone, expense another trillion or so dollars, and then tax everyone in sight to pay for a health care plan that they themselves will be exempt from is not, to put it mildly, going down well. Grassroots protests are breaking out all over the country.

How can this be? Why don’t these slobs get in line and realize we’re doing this to help them? Dissent is patriotic when practiced by left-wingers, but when ordinary citizens who are conservative express their unhappiness it’s mob rule. Of course, the White House is not concerned about such protests — no siree. When you have a mandate from heaven, you don’t worry about a few well-dressed conservative trouble makers.

You don’t worry about ‘em. But you do keep tabs on them. And you ask their friends and neighbors to keep tabs on them, too. And what do you suppose people think about that?

They don’t like it, Linda. Here’s a letter that the distinguished historian and co-founder of FIRE sent to the White House (and to many others)

Dear Big Brother/Big Sister:

The link below is more than “fishy”. . . . it is an intrusion upon the privacy of American citizens, of our right to dissent without records being compiled by political power, and of our foundational civil liberties:

The Democrats seem to getting really frustrated over the fact that Americans aren’t down on their knees begging them for healthcare reform. So now, the White House wants to know if you talk to anyone or read anything about healthcare reform that seems “fishy”.

Boortz has an excellent idea: I urge my readers to act on it: “Take the web address for Linda Douglass’ little speech and send IT to the White House. You can hardly sound more fishy than that.” Indeed. Here’s the email address for the Thought Police:

And here, again, is the link to Linda Douglass’s noxious effort to intimidate people:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/Facts-Are-Stubborn-Things/

Mail her today. Then reflect on David Hume’s observation that “It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once.” That sentence stands as an epigraph to to Friedrich Hayek’s book The Road to Serfdom. It is as pertinent today as when Hayek set it down in 1944.

Click here to view the 24 legacy comments

Click here to hide legacy comments

24 Comments, 24 Threads

1.
SoberHorseThief

I reported something fishy to the address — a conspiracy within the government to force Americans into a government-run single-payer system. This runs straight up to the highest levels! The leader of this conspiracy has been caught on tape telling union co-conspirators that such steps like the current massive bill are necessary to get us on the road to this socialist nightmare.

I cannot believe that Obama is a good communicator at all. He failed miserably explaining his healthcare policy other than telling old geezers to take their pill. Maybe this way old geezers giving the world favor to cease and decease. Since he and his cohorts cannot explain themselves, intimidation is the order of the day.

I think we are heading towards tyranny and oppression if we the people does not wise up.

Marc Ambinder reports the National Journal’s Linda Douglass, the former CBS and ABC News correspondent, is joining the Obama campaign as a senior strategist and spokeswoman. Ben Smith suggests that “the Clinton campaign — and Fox News — is going to have a field day with this.”

At the risk of having a field day myself, Douglass’ move brings to mind a story I did about her for the American Spectator back in 1998. (Not available on the web, as far as I know.) It seems she sometimes found it difficult to draw the line between reporter and source back then:

On March 14, 1994, the CBS Evening News began with word of a big shake- up in the Clinton administration. “Another high-ranking member of the Clinton team was pulled down tonight in the spreading undertow of Whitewater,” anchorwoman Connie Chung announced. “The latest to resign: Webster Hubbell, a high-ranking official at the Justice Department with close ties to the president and Mrs. Clinton.” Chung tossed to correspondent Rita Braver, who reported the story from Detroit, where President Clinton was attending a jobs conference; then to Bob Schieffer, who covered reaction on Capitol Hill, and finally to Linda Douglass, who was traveling with First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton in Colorado.

Douglass reported that Mrs. Clinton was trying to keep the focus on her health care initiative—and away from Whitewater. But she wasn’t having much luck; everywhere she turned, journalists seemed more interested in her role in the Arkansas land deal. The experience was clearly troubling for the first lady, Douglass reported, and Douglass herself seemed almost saddened by the turn of events in Washington. She concluded her report on a faintly elegiac note: “This was a difficult day for Mrs. Clinton as she watched another close friend, Webster Hubbell, forced from public life,” Douglass said. “She had urged him and other friends to join her to serve in Washington; yet despite her power, she’s had to watch some of them fall and has been unable to protect them. Linda Douglass, CBS News, Denver.”

What CBS viewers could not have known was that Webb Hubbell— who later pleaded guilty to stealing $400,000 from his old law firm and cheating on his taxes—was not just the first lady’s friend. He was also a friend of Linda Douglass. From the earliest days of the Clinton administration, Douglass and her husband, an influential public interest lawyer named John Phillips, socialized often with Hubbell and his wife Suzy. Within weeks of Hubbell’s resignation, Phillips put together a deal by which a California non-profit group paid Hubbell $45,000 to write a series of articles on the idea of public service. Later, Phillips and Douglass picked up much of the tab when they and the Hubbells flew to Greece for a ten-day vacation cruising the Aegean Sea. They stayed in touch after Hubbell pleaded guilty—and even after Hubbell went to prison….

Douglass says she told network management about the friendship and recused herself from covering matters involving Hubbell (as she had done earlier with respect to her friend Mickey Kantor). “I am absolutely scrupulous on this issue,” Douglass says. “I pride myself on taking great care to try to avoid those situations.” Once she became close to Hubbell, Douglass says, “I certainly never covered anything having to do with Webb, never covered anything having to do with his problems. I recused myself from that whole story.”

Disaster? Well, it should be. But is it really? Doesn’t Obama’s approval rating stand at 50 percent? That’s a lot of Americans. There’s a lot of rationalizing going on out there. And I don’t think it’s going to stop.

I feel obligated to inform this community that I have confessed to frequently voicing my dissenting opinions to the official govt. email address. When they have searched my internet history, they will be led here. I thought that I should let you know that I have, by proxy, betrayed you to the government. I am deeply sorry. I hope you can save yourselves.

Oh, no! Now Napoleon will have the mill for which Boxer gave his life blown up… Err… I mean in a dictatorial state, the next step would be to find or foment violence at a conservative demonstration, then stamp out any future ones, peaceful or not, with force, “…to preserve the peace and for the children…”

Thomas Jefferson said “Difference of opinion leads to enquiry, and enquiry to truth; and that, I am sure, is the ultimate and sincere object of us both. We both value too much the freedom of opinion sanctioned by our Constitution, not to cherish its exercise even where in opposition to ourselves.” Perhaps this fear of enquiry into this health plan is based on the fear of American citizens discovering some unpleasant truths about it.

I think this may all be an over-reaction. When I follow the link, the `fishy’ line reads:

If you get an email or see something on the web about health insurance reform that seems fishy, send it to flag@whitehouse.gov.

This is a pretty straight-forward request to gather information on the state of the discussion of health care reform. I think it is a unwarranted jump to see it as a request to turn in your neighbor, to name names, to rat out a friend to the Stasi. Maybe when I get hauled in front of the House Un-Obama Activities Committee, I will see it differently.

There is plenty of real substance in the health care reformers agenda to attack with gusto. Getting too upset about this sort of thing will not win hearts and minds, and will convince the wavering middle-of-the-roaders that we are all birther conspiracy nuts.

On a somewhat related topic, I recently read the comment thread on a Daily Kos diary related to releasing the names of people who signed a petition. (It was a discouraging task, and I had to take a shower later. My those children are rude.)

While there was strong support for making public the names of the petition signers, because of course everyone should own up to what they say and stand behind it, every single commenter was identified by an alias, a `handle’. How brave they all are!

The odds are that Barack Obama is now a marginalized figure—but I am not absolutely sure I am right. Let’s hope his favorable numbers soon drop to under 45%. The main thing that concerns me is white guilt. There are just so many caucasian Americans who wish to prove they are not racists. They find any excuse to support him. Only recently have I actually viewed Obama’s famous speech at the 2004 Democratic Party national convention. It turned out to be nothing more than a modest 16-17 minute exercise in cheer leading! There was nothing great about it whatsoever. Race guilt may be greatest threat facing Western Civilization. At this point in time, it is likely the only thing saving Obama from outright political oblivion.

Nazi Germany, Soviet Russia, N Korea, and Obama’s America all asking neighbors, friends, and family member to report neighbors, friends, and family members to the Government who don’t agree with the Democratic party and Obama! What’s next Obama? Block captains trained to watch & report their friends, the Obama youth trained to turn in their parents, or knocks on the doors at 2AM by the Obama SS of tea party or town hall activists? What are you thinking?

It’s not the last sentence of the paragraph(the one you quoted) that is offensive. It is the line in which the White House says “or through casual conversation.” That means, if you send your buddy an email and the White House doesn’t agree with it, you should forward it to Big Brother. We’re talking private correspondence here; not just forwarding links found on the Internet. What exactly are they going to do with that information? I encourage everyone to send an email to flag@whitehouse.gov and cut/paste the following address in the body of your message:

“There is a lot of disinformation about health insurance reform out there, spanning from control of personal finances to end of life care. These rumors often travel just below the surface via chain emails or through casual conversation. Since we can’t keep track of all of them here at the White House, we’re asking for your help. If you get an email or see something on the web about health insurance reform that seems fishy, send it to flag@whitehouse.gov.”

Of course we mean people to send in the rumors, not the names of people passing them on. We want to get all of the ideas out in the sunshine, where democracy happens. We asked people to send in fishy information on health care, not names. Read what we said carefully: we only asked for the disinformation, not the disinformers.

And they will look reasonable and we will look shrill and over the top, modern day John Birchers.

We have already been suckered in on the birth certificate ploy, and here is another wriggling worm on a hook for us to go after. Honestly, I don’t see us winning anything here, but getting played and marginalized. Again.